Orchestras Canada

The Kindred Spirits Orchestra (Kristian Alexander, music director) has released details of its 2012-13 season, a six concert program at the Markham Theatre for the Performing Arts (to the north of Toronto), featuring outstanding younger Canadian soloists, core orchestral classics, and the group’s third annual contemporary music festival. For more information about the group, please visit ksorchestra.ca.

The Kamloops Symphony has announced its 2012-13 season, with performances in Kamloops and Salmon Arm, full orchestral and chamber concerts, and – for the first time in 20 years – guest conductors, complementing the long-time and inspirational leadership of Music Director Bruce Dunn. Featured soloists include Judy Kang (in Marjan Mozetich’s Affairs of the Heart), Stephane Lemelin, the Jeans ‘n Classics band, the Fine Arts Quartet, and the KSO Chorus. For more information about the season, please visit kamloopssymphony.com.

This Saturday, March 10, the Kamloops Symphony (led by Music Director Bruce Dunn) celebrates the 200th anniversary of Fort Kamloops, which was built in September 1812 and was the first non-native settlement in Southern BC. Fittingly, the program is all-Canadian, and celebrates the region’s strong musical traditions, with works by Phil Nimmons, Hal Beckett, Glenn Morley, Howard Cable, and Imant Raminsh. The centrepiece of the program is Hal Beckett’s Reflections, originally commissioned by the Kamloops Symphony in 2008 as a BC150 project. A multi- media piece combining spoken word, visual images and song with orchestral music, the score has been re-worked to include the Kamloops Symphony Chorus. Historical images borrowed from the Kamloops Museum and Archives will be projected behind the orchestra to illustrate the song and spoken word subjects of the work: logging, mining, the gold rush and the railway. Actor Christopher Weddell, a founding member of the Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival, will perform the speaking parts, which describe the lives of early miners, loggers and railway workers.

The Kamloops Symphony recently announced that it has received a $10,000 grant from the TELUS Community Board to develop a new educational program for elementary school children.

The program will be called “The Science of Sound”, and it will deliver a combination of experiences to participants through science workshops that will demonstrate various aspcts of sound production, along with performances, by members of the Kamloops Symphony, demonstrating how their instruments produce sound. The program will be provided for grade 4 School District #73 students at no cost to the schools or to the students. The program is being designed by a group that includes the KSO’s Bruce Dunn and Kathy Humphreys, as well as KSO volunteer David McKinnon (President of the Big Little Science Centre) and School District #73 Fine Arts Coordinator Lori Jane Froese.

Speaking about the project, Kathy noted that “the idea [is] to engage students in a hands-on experience relevant to the science curriculum while allowing them to connect closely to music, musical instruments and musicians in small groups. Sound is part of the grade 4 science curriculum so this was a perfect fit.”

Meanwhile, the Kawartha Youth Orchestra has announced that it will be presenting a concert designed for students in grades 7-12 that focuses specifically on the role of the conductor. The program is the culminating activity for KYO assistant conductor Dina Gilbert, whose eight-week apprenticeship with the orchestra was made possible by a partnership with Market Hall Theatre, the Peterborough Symphony Orchestra and the RBC Foundation. The program includes live performance by the KYO, big-screen illustrations of the work of great conductors (found, where else, on YouTube) and a downloadable electronic Teacher Guide. The program touches on the requirements in Ontario’s Curriculum Guide, and will inspire participants to explore musical elements from dynamics to identifying instrument families in an orchestra, and will also offer them the chance to conduct a real, live orchestra!

Again this week, we honour the programmers who successfully balance tradition and innovation in their seasonal concerts. Here’s a round-up of interesting-sounding programs from across the country:

December 15, 16 and 17, I Musici de Montreal (under the guest leadership of harpsichordist Joel Thiffault) presents a program of baroque and contemporary repertoire reflective of the season, as part of the orchestra’s series at Ogilvy’s. Among other delights, the program includes “Winter” from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, a recent work by Michael Oesterle, and William Boyce’s Ode for the New Year 1756.

This Friday (December 16), the National Arts Centre Orchestra partners with composer/broadcaster/performer Andrew Craig, the Faith Chorale, and an impressive array of soloists that includes Jackie Richardson to present a Gospel Christmas Celebration.

This Friday night and Saturday afternoon (December 16 and 17), the Orchestre symphonique de Québec (led by Stéphane Laforest) presents La Grande Virée de Noel, featuring Gregory Charles, Marie-Josée Lord, Nicolas Pellerin and les Grands Hurleurs, and seven choirs from the region. The youth-oriented performances take place at the Pavillon de la Jeunesse at ExpoCité, and features not only seasonal carols but also a giant Karaoke and dance party with DJ Adam Doubleyou.

Saturday night (December 17), the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra (led by music director James Sommerville) presents a pair of seasonal programs featuring the internationally-renowned Toronto Mass Choir. There’s a shorter 2 p.m. concert, designed for families, as well as a full-length evening concert intended for an older audience.

December 17, the Lethbridge Symphony presents a traditional Christmas program with a twist: this year’s guest performers include not only the Bridge Bells bell ringing ensemble, but also Lethbridge’s MP (and a former member of the LSO violin section) Jim Hillyer, who will re-join the violin section for the evening. Speaking about the experience, Mr. Hillyer said, “I am looking forward to playing with the symphony once again. Over the years when I performed with the LSO I felt privileged to be able to get an inside seat for some amazing world class performances,” noting Elgar’s Cello Concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, the Mozart Requiem, and Handel’s Messiah as particular highlights.

December 17 and 18, the Kamloops Symphony (led by Music Director Bruce Dunn) presents a pair of performances encapsulating what it describes as “a celebration of community that provides all the required ingredients for comfort and joy – stories, songs, young performers, warmth and fun!” Featured performers include soprano Carlene Wiebe (a member of the faculty of the Kamloops Symphony Music School), violist Madeleine Haynes (2011 winner of the Kamloops Symphony Award at the Kamloops Festival of the Performing Arts), baritone Aaron Durand, the KSO Chorus, and a number of students from the Kamloops Symphony Music School.

Sometimes we get media releases that simply make us happy – and so it was with this recent announcement from the Kamloops Symphony about a free concert they’re presenting on September 10 at the Sagebrush Theatre.

The concert is in honour of the late Dick Dickens, “the respected leader of a very successful band and choir program at Kamloops Senior Secondary School for many years, a volunteer conductor of the Kamloops Community Band, a sometimes outspoken member of the Kamloops School Board in his retirement, and a strong voice for the political causes that were important to him. Dick never married and had no children of his own. His family were his friends and colleagues, and he had a keen interest in keeping in touch with his former students. He also had a mischievous sense of humour that was often exhibited in the form of practical jokes. As if it wasn’t enough that he worked tirelessly at his teaching career and in the community throughout his life, Dick created a legacy through his will to provide support for his two passions – education and music – after his death.”

The concert will unite the Kamloops Symphony and the Kamloops Rube Band in an unlikely, humorous and entertaining mix of classical and band repertoire, polkas and marches. (Do click on the link: the sousaphone alone is worth the trip.) For more information, please visit kamloopssymphony.com.

Massive symphonic spectaculars are all very well, but sometimes it’s nice to hear smaller ensemble repertoire performed in an intimate environment. If you agree with this assertion, it’s a good week or so in Canada! Here are some chamber orchestra/chamber ensemble highlights from member orchestras.

The Windsor Symphony wraps up its 63rd concert season today, April 29, with a pair of performances of music by Bach and Telemann at Assumption University Chapel, led by harpsichordist/conductor Jeannette Sorrell of Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire.

The Kamloops Symphony’s chamber music series wraps up tomorrow, April 30, with a program of music by Cesar Franck, Camille Saint-Saens, Vincent d’Indy, and Phillipe Gaubert, performed by KSO core professional musicians Catharine Dochstader (flute), Sally Arai (clarinet), Martin Kratky (cello) and guest Dimiter Terziev (piano).

The Saskatoon Symphony’s Chamber Orchestra series concludes this Saturday, April 30, with a program that celebrates the “spirit of a creative explosion, centred in Paris after the First World War, when traditional views on art, music, and writing were challenged and reshaped.” Works on the program include a pair of Gymnopédies by Erik Satie, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella, Harry Somers’ Picasso Suite and Respighi’s Gli Uccelli.

On May 5, the chamber orchestra of the Orchestre symphonique de Longueuil (led by Music Director Marc David) performs Boucherville composer Michel Massé’s Requiem pour Roxanne at the Sainte-Famille church in Boucherville. The work, “filled with light and serenity” is dedicated to the memory of the composer’s niece, who died from complications of cystic fibrosis at the age of 11.

On May 6, Musaeus, the core ensemble of the Lethbridge Symphony, presents a program entitled “Life Lessons”, including Britten’s Simple Symphony, Smetana’s String Quartet “From My Life”, and a work by J-P Christopher Jackson, a composer and musicologist long associated with the Department of Music at the University of Lethbridge, entitled Bromptons, An English Rhapsody. This last work features bass baritone John Conlon, and is based on an unfinished pastoral romance written by Brian Tyson, a bittersweet memory of one man’s youth.

Next Saturday, March 12, the Kamloops Symphony (led by Music Director Bruce Dunn) presents Similia, the duo of twin sisters Annie Labrie (guitar) and Nadia Labrie (flute) in concert with the orchestra. The program repeats in Salmon Arm the following afternoon.

The program includes a commissioned work by Canadian Patrick Roux entitled Concerto Tradicionuevo, Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen in an arrangement for solo flute, and two ever-green works for orchestra: Michael Matthews’ Between the Wings of the Earth, and Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony. www.kamloopssymphony.com

We read a lot of media releases – and this month, we’re reading about a number of performances of new and tested works by Canadian composers. What’s caught our eye?

November 13, the Hamilton Philharmonic, led by Music Director James Sommerville, reprises last January’s successful premiere of the HPO-commissioned Black Sand by Kelly-Marie Murphy. On that same night, the Kamloops Symphony, led by Bruce Dunn, performs John Estacio’s Such Sweet Sorrow, for string orchestra.

November 15, the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, led by David Currie, performs Oskar Morawetz’s Carnival Overture and Andrew P. MacDonald’s Violin Concerto, featuring Symphony Nova Scotia concertmaster Robert Uchida.

During “an ongoing search for a venue with the best acoustics possible, that also meets the needs of the audience and the performers”, the Kamloops Symphony’s Chamber Music Series continues on November 6 with its first performance in a new venue – the Kamloops Convention Centre Theatre. A quartet of Kamloops Symphony musicians – including Principal Cellist Martin Kratky, in his series debut – will perform a program they titled Anniversaries, that was chosen to highlight the birthdays of composers Bach and Schumann and the 50th anniversary of the death of composer Dohnányi.

The Kamloops Symphony has launched its new season, and, as the orchestra’s enthusiastic media release says:  ”Music Director Bruce Dunn has done it again! His twenty first season with the Kamloops Symphony is just as fresh and new as the first one was.”  The KSO’s program for 2010-11 includes a ten-concert classics series featuring “treasured Kamloops performers” and well-known Canadian soloists, a 6-concert chamber music series, and such special events as a recital by tenor Richard Margison, and a sing-along Messiah.  It’s a busy season – but that’s not all:  the KSO presents a three-concert series in Salmon Arm as well.  To learn more, please visit here.